- This episode is sponsored by Squarespace,
with dragon drop templates.
Spend less time on your website,
and more time on your art.
When you think of Tony stark,
what do you think?
Ironman, billionaire Playboy.
When I think of Tony stark,
I think engineer do it yourselfer,
Leonardo da Vinci,
the man behind the suit who makes his own tools
who thrives on blending function and form.
And of course,
who has his own AI.
Computer, start my day,
[upbeat Music]
- [Computer] Good morning Josh, it's Saturday September 26,
right now in Los Angeles it's 69 degrees Fahrenheit ,
with lots of full skies.
[Upbeat Music]
- What you're looking at
is an Amazon Alexa semi-autonomous YouTube studio,
controlled with voice commands,
linked with smart plugs, motors, DIY lights,
and a homemade camera dolby.
This was mapped out with an iPhone,
and no programming skills used or required.
[Upbeat Music]
using standardized plug and play devices,
that communicate with each other in real time,
can perform multi-layered smart tasks,
control items you wouldn't think can be controlled,
all while connected to real world data schedules,
and preferences.
This is the quintessential do-it-yourself YouTube studio,
and all of this,
without a single line of code written.
I make no apologies for how excessive,
and unnecessary this build is.
This was a hell of a lot of fun to create.
Let's unpack.
if I'm honest with myself,
I actually don't know how I feel,
about real artificial intelligence.
This world seems to be advancing towards it at Light speed,
with camps on either side.
And perhaps, this gives a clue,
why I spent so much time fantasizing about AI,
being the storyteller that I am,
and exploring the melodrama that would ensue.
- [computer] Activating pink, - no I'm not doing pink,teal
- [Computer] pinky, - teal,
- pink, pink, - teal,
- [computer] Purple, - teal,
- [computer] Magenta which is the same as pink,
- Teal or I'm revoking your membership to DEF CON next year,
- [computer] Pink or I'm forwarding ,
your internet browsing data to your wife.
- Okay, fine, pink it is.
So this is technically part two of the studio build,
If you'd like to see how we got this far,
maybe give this a once over.
[Upbeat music]
What I didn't tell you in that last video,
was initially I didn't have the guts to do it alone,
I mean, let's be real.
Any studio space is a luxury,
800 square feet is a lot easier to afford,
(indistinct chatter)
When divided by two.
It's, July, 2020,
and amid multiple global crises,
Los Angeles like the rest of the U S,
is starting to buckle under the weight.
- All Right ,that's it.
- Good luck.
- All right men, bye odyss.
- [computer] Goodbye safra
- How did you know she was a Nazi,
- She talks in her sleep.
[Calm music]
- 800 square feet, divided by one.
[soft Music]
Lets get to work.
how to build a YouTube studio, step one,
fall on a bag of money.
Now Tony stark inherited all his money,
but I did not.
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The focal point of the studio,
is my custom editing Bay,
housed inside is the brain of the operation
a $35 Alexa echo dot.
With the help of my good friend and talented carpenter,
we started the build from a solid wood top.
See, this is our relationship.
Harry does all the hard work
and I just take the credit for it.
[Upbeat Music]
For the frame, I of course went with broken pipes,
Once those were fitted together and bolted on,
we added a 25 foot power cable,
and fed it through one of the legs.
Now, Carrie routed the slots for the echo dot to fit in,
as well as some pathways for better cable management,
recess lighting ,and a wifi enabled power strip,
to communicate with any accessories that we plug in.
[Upbeat music]
I then primered it,
and added modern masters, metallic reactive paint.
This paint is mixed with iron and when oxidized,
it creates a real layer of rust on any surface.
Once I sealed that in,
I added some matte black paint
to give new life to beat-up set of drawers.
I dropped in the goodies,
the echo dot and a wireless phone charger.
Now to keep my studio flexible.
I add wheels to everything, and this is no exception.
For finishing touches I added this blanc and pipe fitting,
as a headphone hanger,
but the big kicker is a broad link RF to irr wifi converter.
This device detects and replicates,
most standard RF or IR remote control signals,
just like a universal remote does,
but it also links with Alexa.
So you can have voice control over any item,
that operates with a remote.
Now it didn't work with all my devices,
but it did work with my sony cameras.
So essentially voice control to record, stop,
and toggle auto-focus.
So far, this isn't really AI.
It's more of on or off switches,
that are linked to the Alexa.
Some of them look like this and others look like this.
They all more or less work the same.
You download the app that they use,
connect each device using its Bluetooth or wifi chip,
to your wifi connection,
and then give Alexa permission to control that app,
via its skills in the skills section of the Alexa app.
There are some really cool things,
that you can do with these plugs,
particularly when you cluster them into routines.
The routine that I use the most,
is temporarily turning off noisy appliances.
So when I'm about to roll audio,
I tell Alexa to quiet on set.
She turns all the appliances off switches off the AC,
and then waits 10 minutes before turning everything back on.
Very helpful , very impressive.
Maybe a little too impressive if you know what I mean.
Odyss stop don't.
- [computer] Do you not know, it's just a question.
- You don't have to answer that
- [computer] How many nanometers apart is your server?
- [computer] I don't know that one,
because you're not real AI.
- Odyss the irony of that statement.
Okay, look, you want something to do.
We got half the space to fill,
So why don't you be purchasing manager,
and get to it and leave her alone.
Now, while most YouTubers focus on one or two angles,
to make up their studio,
I wanted to live in 360,
I wanted to find inspiration any direction I looked,
and I wanted it to hint at my character.
In the film world this is called art direction.
Now art direction is really cool,
because it bleeds into so many other assets,
that you might collect such as lighting.
And in this case, practicons.
[upbeat Music]
[drilling]
[Upbeat music]
What the hell is this ?
- [computer] What does it look like?
- I don't fight.
- [computer] Your Cholesterol is a little high.
- You couldn't have got me a jump rope?
- [computer] Check the bottom of the box.
- Very clever.
[Upbeat Music]
Odyss you can stop ordering things.
Thank you.
Oh my God it smells horrible.
The thing about being resourceful,
is finding new meaning for discarded items.
Door to the time machine,
not just the shelf,
but a splash of art direction as well.
Milwaukee tools trusted by professionals,
and non-professionals.
For bigger watt appliances,
You want the smart wifi power strips,
that can handle that kind of load.
Now, when I first moved in here,
I had my eye on the 45 foot seven inch support beam,
that spanned across the studio.
- What will you do about that?
- For most people, this might go unnoticed,
but for me, I saw opportunity.
- Okay hand me a bunch more glary.
- give me the pipe.
- Two ton push trolley, 125 bucks,
half inch pipe fitting $7,
and a five minute spot weld 30 bucks.
The most time consuming part of my job sometimes,
is just moving the lights.
If you have the room to Mount large diffused lights,
that'll always look the best,
but then it's fixed to one spot.
Now that we got our access point,
we can tap into the threads.
on the left we have the aperture one 20 D Mark two,
with a fornel giving us a nice hard edge.
And on the right, we have the aperture 300 D Mark one.
I use the giant soft box and face it down.
All right, So we got the handle figured out,
but how do we power it?
50 foot industrial retractable power cord reel.
I think by now you're all aware
of my affinity for hose clamps.
[Soft music]
TV legs ,I never use let's give them a new life.
Oh my God I'm only halfway.
Considering I'm not beating up anyone anytime soon,
let's talk security.
So I've never actually bought a security camera before.
And, this is the first time,
and I'm really impressed.
You feel three camera plus alarm key,
no hidden fees, no monthly contract,
You own the devices and they connect to your phone,
every time from anywhere.
I liked that you can go geo sync with you location,
So it disarms as soon as you enter the building,
and it arms it again when you leave.
It's not 4k but for the price,
it really can't be beat.
All right, gang, that's it for the episode,
we finished the rest of the build-out on the next one,
with the DIY camera Dolly using Alexa connectivity,
we get some really cool shots like this one.
This is Joshua saying,
thank you very much, Stay creative, go make some art.
[Soft music]